About once a month, at the Kroger on Madison Avenue in Covington, Kentucky, I’ll pick up an eight pound bag of Jumbo Russet Potatoes. That bag of potatoes will last me the whole month.

I never do anything else with those potatoes except bake them. I heat up the oven to 450 degrees and bake three or four of them for about an hour and a half.

Before I put them in the oven, I prick each one with a fork—prick each one about 60 times. Seriously. Don’t tell me that’s overkill because I’ll keep doing it anyway.

I wrap each Jumbo Russet Potato in aluminum foil. Friends have suggested to me other ways to bake these potatoes. I politely nod my head when they give me their ideas. Don’t ask me what they are because I’m not really listening. I like baking my potatoes in aluminum foil. I have no intention of changing that.

When the potatoes are finished baking, I’ll usually eat one, then put what’s left in the refrigerator to eat later. When I’m hungry for one, I’ll stick it in the microwave for a couple minutes—less aluminum foil, of course.

I like sour cream on baked potatoes but I normally don’t have it in my refrigerator. I usually just have the potato with salt and pepper and Blue Bonnet Margarine.

A lot of the time when I’m eating a Jumbo Russet Potato, I think of my father. He loved baked potatoes. I like them too, but not as much as he did.